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eyes. He straightened as though
a battery had touched his spine.
"I did it I took them," he
muttered, his face ghastly, his
jaws set hard. '! substituted the
collaterals the others? they
went in the crash." Finished in
his sacrifice, he sank back weak
ly again and held hi shead dumb
ly between his hands until they
came and took him away.
The trial was mercifully short.
Not a word did the young teller
with the set jaws and the far
away look in his eyes say in his
own defense. He had taken the
bonds; that was all. Once Arm
strong's beseeching eyes came to
him in the dock from where the
cashier stood for a moment in the
door of the court room. Vernon
flashed back a look of scathing
contempt; but in it Armstrong
also read security. It was but a
month or so later when they
found Armstrong crumpled
across a rickety bed in a cheap
rooming house. The draught of
air that came with the breaking
open of the doof fluttered his er
ratically scrawled confession to
the faded carpet of the room. Dis
covery of heavy peculations of
which the Third National was
the victim, followed the last hon
est, honorable act of the man who
had been Unable to pull himself
from the mire. Exoneration of
the man who had begun the pa
tient plying of his hands in the
manufacture of coarse articles of
barter within the cold walls of
the penitentiary, came too.
It was Louise Pierce, quiet,
pale and a tiifle neivous, who
with sweet dignity asked the
stern-faced warden ' that she
might he the one to break the
glad news to the man who had
followed the deadly dull routine
of the prison without a murmur
of complaint at his sacrifice. The"
face of him, who had dealt only
with the dregs of humanity soft
ened as he looked a moment into
the eyes of the beautiful woman.
In whispers he gave an order;
and as firm footsteps sounded
through the concrete hall, he
gracefully withdrew that they
L might be alone at the meeting.
He passed Vernon, a strange
light burning in his eyes, just
outside the door and smiled kind
ly into the set face above ;the dis
gracing uniform.
Unheralded, the warden's re
turn half an hour later was not
heard ; and he paused in the door
way befpre giving the hoarse
cough of warning that broke in
startlingly above the soft mur
muring from over near the, win
dow. With slender arms clasped"
about his neck, Louise stood close
in the embrace of the man who
had regained honor. Unheeding
of its roughness, a blushing
cheek, damp with tears, was
pressed tightly against the coarse
jacket. Vernon looked down"
upon her, the tender light in his
eyes erasing every hard line of
suffering from his face; quite
gently he was stroking the golden v
strands that swept back just
above her ears.
"But we must wait at least a
year," a soft voice murmured,